FIRE ERIC HOLDER

Here is today’s column in USA Today calling for the firing of Attorney General Eric Holder (I have added a couple lines removed in editing). Holder is not the only individual who needs to leave federal office but he is the first. Equally responsible are his deputy, James Cole, and Ronald Machen Jr., the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia who played critical roles in the investigation of journalists with Associated Press and Fox News. Notably, Obama reportedly “fired” IRS Director Steve Miller (who was reportedly already leaving) over the IRS scandal though there is no indication of any knowledge on his part. In Holder’s case, he was personally involved in targeting journalists (in the Fox case) and launched an attack on the media that has been condemned by a wide array of public interest and media groups. Yet, Holder has been asked to hold a simple meeting with aggrieved media representatives by Obama.

Recently, Attorney General Eric Holder appeared before the House Judiciary Committee to answer questions about the administration’s sweeping surveillance of journalists with the Associated Press. In the greatest attack on the free press in decades, the Justice Department seized phone records for reporters and editors in at least three AP offices as well as its office in the House of Representatives. Holder, however, proceeded to claim absolute and blissful ignorance of the investigation, even failing to recall when or how he recused himself.

Yet, this was only the latest attack on the news media under Holder’s leadership. Despite his record, he expressed surprise at the hearing that the head of the Republican National Committee had called for his resignation. After all, Holder pointed out, he did nothing. That is, of course, precisely the point. Unlike the head of the RNC, I am neither a Republican nor conservative, and I believe Holder should be fired.

The ‘sin eater’

Holder’s refusal to accept responsibility for the AP investigation was something of a change for the political insider. His value to President Obama has been his absolute loyalty. Holder is what we call a “sin eater” inside the Beltway — high-ranking associates who shield presidents from responsibility for their actions. Richard Nixon had H.R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman. Ronald Reagan had Oliver North and Robert “Bud” McFarlane. George W. Bush had the ultimate sin eater: Dick Cheney, who seemed to have an insatiable appetite for sins to eat.

This role can be traced to 18th century Europe, when families would use a sin eater to clean the moral record of a dying person by eating bread from the person’s chest and drinking ale passed over his body. Back then, the ritual’s power was confined to removing minor sins.

For Obama, there has been no better sin eater than Holder. When the president promised CIA employees early in his first term that they would not be investigated for torture, it was the attorney general who shielded officials from prosecution. When the Obama administration decided it would expand secret and warrantless surveillance, it was Holder who justified it. When the president wanted the authority to kill any American he deemed a threat without charge or trial, it was Holder who went public to announce the “kill list” policy.

Last week, the Justice Department confirmed that it was Holder who personally approved the equally abusive search of Fox News correspondent James Rosen’s e-mail and phone records in another story involving leaked classified information. In the 2010 application for a secret warrant, the Obama administration named Rosen as “an aider and abettor and/or co-conspirator” to the leaking of classified materials. The Justice Department even investigated Rosen’s parents’ telephone number, and Holder was there to justify every attack on the news media.

Ignoble legacy

Yet, at this month’s hearing, the attorney general had had his fill. Accordingly, Holder adopted an embarrassing mantra of “I have no knowledge” and “I had no involvement” throughout the questioning. When he was not reciting the equivalent to his name, rank and serial number, he was implicating his aide, Deputy Attorney General James Cole. Cole, it appears, is Holder’s sin eater. Holder was so busy denying responsibility for today’s scandals, he began denying known facts about older scandals. For example, Holder was asked about an earlier scandal in his administration in the handling of the “Fast and Furious” program where guns were allowed to be sold to criminal gangs. Holder insisted that Ronald C. Machen Jr., the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, was not told to decline the prosecution of Holder for contempt of Congress after refusing to turn over key documents and that “[Machen] made the determination about what he was going to do on his own.” However, Holder’s deputy, Cole, wrote to Machen to inform him (before the contempt citation even reached his office) that Main Justice “has determined that the Attorney General’s response to the subpoena . . . does not constitute a crime.”

In the end, Holder was the best witness against his continuing in office. His insistence that he did nothing was a telling moment. The attorney general has done little in his tenure to protect civil liberties or the free press. Rather, Holder has supervised a comprehensive erosion of privacy rights, press freedom and due process. This ignoble legacy was made possible by Democrats who would look at their shoes whenever the Obama administration was accused of constitutional abuses.

On Thursday, Obama responded to the outcry over the AP and Fox scandals by calling for an investigation by … you guessed it … Eric Holder. He ordered Holder to meet with news media representatives to hear their “concerns” and report back to him. He sent his old sin eater for a confab with the very targets of the abusive surveillance. Such an inquiry offers no reason to trust its conclusions.

The feeble response was the ultimate proof that these are Obama’s sins despite his effort to feign ignorance. It did not matter that Holder is the sin eater who has lost his stomach or that such mortal sins are not so easily digested. Indeed, these sins should be fatal for any attorney general.

Jonathan Turley, the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University, is a member of USA TODAY’s Board of Contributors.

Hi Jon, I must say I’m disappointed to see you go for this ‘sin eater’ formulation. Why not ‘whipping boy’? After all, you are implying a massive corruption of the Office of the President, and the AG, and the DAG, and I’m sensing that you would happily indict the entire DoJ. For what, exactly? Oh right, for activity that is perfectly legal under the PATRIOT Act. It is that disastrous law that is the problem, not the government officials acting under it. Calling for the firing of officials for acting within the law, but failing to constrain themselves in a way that you feel would be appropriate? Hmmm, that reeks of politics.

Not the other Jon has some good points.
But I cant stand Holder and the reasons are imprecise. There is something about his looks, his contenance, that is unsettling. Is he from NYC or some such place? Inquiring minds want to know.

I lied when I said that I spoke the truth,
And I speak the truth when I say that I lied.
I come from a land where they think it uncouth
To utilize language that hasn’t yet died
Because they prefer to sell War to their youth
While shedding fake tears at the Peace they’ve decried.

I tell you for sure that I mean what I say,
And you must believe me ’cause you’ve got no way
To know if from paths straight and narrow I’ll stray
Whenever I want what you’ve got on your tray.

I merely speak noises which I have observed
Make people do just about any damn thing;
While, still, for my own inner self I’ve reserved
What I really mean by the sounds that I sing,
Leaving up to my listeners what they have deserved
For thinking they know why the words soothe or sting.

My lies I support with true evidence scant;
But since I regard you as one potted plant,
I’m sure that you’ll swallow my self-serving rant
Even though it consists of discredited cant

I truthfully lie, and as falsely speak true
While reason and ethics I ceaselessly flout.
I’m Jabberwock captain of one hopeless crew
Who followed me in where no one can get out.
So breathe in the smoke that I’ve exhaled at you
And lie down, saluting, the true lies I spout.

I oppose the call for Holder’s resignation. There is nothing here rising to that level. At this point in time, under the current conditions, It may very well be impossible to run a Justice Department pleasing to all. Lose Holder under these circumstances, and you feed the hate-government-at-every level-at any-cost-crowd. Not worth it.

Excellent post. And the response of the Obama lovers is…he’s only as bad as GWB was, so what’s the big deal? Please, this man took bad GWB policies and made them worse. The kill list alone is worth Mr. O’s and Holders impeachment. The problem is we have a Congress that would rather not make decisions and let the Prez do it all. If you tolerate it now it will only grow worse with the next administration, no matter the letter it comes from.

Lrobby99 is content to watch as our country erodes its rights and freedoms and continues its descent into tyranny unabated. Well as long as it is his party doing it that is, then it is ‘all good’ It is only bad when the other party is in office.

Partisan politics has reached a thoroughly wretched point within this nation.

To say AG Holder is totally responsible unfair, and it prevents Obama from taking the heat. Both are responsible for these acts of stupidity (IRS scandal) and neglect (ATF Weapons Scandal involving Mexico). Or is it incompentence on Holder’s behalf? If I was Holder, I wouldn’t resign. I would let Obama fire me, go on FoxNews & before Congress stating: Obama told me to do it.

It is very important if you discover ‘agents tracing the leak of a highly classified C.I.A. report on North Korea to a Fox News reporter pulled electronic archives showing which officials had gained access to the report and had contact with the reporter on the day of the leak.’ that you ignore such reports because they probably will amount to nothing. Did Mr Turley come down hard on the White House whenever a security leak occurred like the GOP politicized the event?

There are a semi truck load of reason to hual Obama, his crew & many members of both political parties in front of multiple grand juries to examine criminal laws I feel they broke, including their acts of treason.

1 of 6 video wasn’t avialable on youtube, but you can start with this below.

This video series only deal with a few of the hundreds of important issues.

There are a semi truck load of reason to haul Obama, his crew & many members of both political parties in front of multiple grand juries to examine criminal laws I feel they broke, including their acts of treason.

1 of 6 video wasn’t available on youtube, but you can start with this below.

The administration’s plan is to hunker down and play the “This is all Republicans being mean” card. Kudos for Mr. Turley, but unfortunately many here and elsewhere stand mute, just like the president and AG. The prez still has some errand boy/girl press doing his bidding. And he’ll always have his solid 20% voters.However, my sense is there is much to come. We are going to have a 4 year quadriplegic duck tenure to end the legacy of a man who thought he could bring Chicago Machine politics to DC.

The Bush administration turned the U.S. military into a global propaganda machine while imposing tough restrictions on journalists seeking to give the public truthful reports about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Associated Press chief executive Tom Curley said Friday.

Curley, speaking to journalists at the University of Kansas, said the news industry must immediately negotiate a new set of rules for covering war because “we are the only force out there to keep the government in check and to hold it accountable.”
…
I spent last year in Afghanistan, visiting and talking with U.S. troops and their Afghan partners. My duties with the Army’s Rapid Equipping Force took me into every significant area where our soldiers engage the enemy. Over the course of 12 months, I covered more than 9,000 miles and talked, traveled and patrolled with troops in Kandahar, Kunar, Ghazni, Khost, Paktika, Kunduz, Balkh, Nangarhar and other provinces.

What I saw bore no resemblance to rosy official statements by U.S. military leaders about conditions on the ground.

Wow, I’m glad you’re not a professor at my school because your legal analysis is shockingly bad. Not only that but your conflation of distinct policy choices by the President (CIA torture prosecutions and targeted killing) with Eric Holder’s performance have nothing to do with one another. I’m much rather have an analysis of the first amendment concerns implicated rather than some self-aggrandizing tirade.

The request the president made to have holder meet with the aggrieved reporter in person reminded me of the time where the president risked alienating the entire American police community when he said the police “acted stupidly” in the arrest of a Harvard Professor in Cambridge.

The police labour guild president publicly demanded an apology from the president, who then arranged for him to meet with the president at the white house and share a beer.

The mechanics of this was essentially to keep the matter quiet. I wouldn’t have accepted the president’s invitation but would have instead said that he could apologize in a broadcast press conference since he insulted the police in a national forum, he could apologize in the same manner.

I think the president is trying the same tactic for holder and the aggrieved reporter.

Holder should have gone a long tome ago. This most recent scandal is just one reason that he should not serve as Attorney General. Under his watch, the DOJ has gone after whistle-blowers–while giving criminal banksters a slap on the wrist. Still, Holder is Obama’s choice for this office. A fish rots from the head.

Maybe the poster of the message claiming the Patriot Act as the cause of all this is just being facetious. He’s just joking. Or maybe not. If serious then this law is being used as a crutch/catch-all for assigning blame to. It’s like the Boston Strangler claiming that the piano wire is at fault for all his evil deeds.
As for Holder it’s real simple. It’s apparent that he lied to Congress under oath. If he’s not held accountable for that then who can?

“Wow, I’m glad you’re not a professor at my school because your legal analysis is shockingly bad. Not only that but your conflation of distinct policy choices by the President (CIA torture prosecutions and targeted killing) with Eric Holder’s performance have nothing to do with one another.”

****************

Not sure who you are referring to, but I’d hold my assessment of someone else’s legal reasoning and analysis until after I graduated from law school and not just shortly after I’d gotten through the doors.

As for your “conflation” dilemma, I’d suggest you take a gander at the news amid your reading of cases to find that Holder’s work was an instrumental part of the justification for failing to investigate CIA torture and targeting killing. Not saying I disagree with everything Holder says or did, merely that your analysis of the AG and his role in the defining legal policy for this Administration puts you squarely in the abecedarian camp.

“I hate newspapermen. They come into camp and pick up their camp rumors and print them as facts. I regard them as spies, which, in truth, they are. If I killed them all there would be news from Hell before breakfast.”

William Tecumseh Sherman

Turley is upset because a fellow traveller got caught with his hand in the cookie jar. The government certainly has the right to investigate a breach of national security in the form of classified documents. Turley apparently assumes that the reporter bears no liability for this breach regardless of whether or not the investigation shows particiaption.

Fair minded people might question what should or should not be classified. That, however, is very much a case of the eye of the be Holder.

We have a Racketeering case against Goldman Sachs and Bain Capital; which includes confessions to more than 34 acts of Perjury by their (secret) counsels. However, it involves a corrupt (former) Delaware U. S Attorney (Colm Connolly) who was also secretly Mitt Romney’s / Bain Capital attorney in 2001 (when Romney WAS CEO of Bain Capital).

Holder’s DOJ would rather help organized crime continue;
than to point out Dept of Justice inadequacies.

He isnt a real liberal in the sense of an Adlai Stevenson but he is a post 1965 liberal definitely or maybe we need a refinement of what the democratic party stands for today and the classification of the various ideologies present under that umbrella.

I think many in the Democratic Party have eschewed Adlai Stevenson style liberalism in favor of a more totalitarian form as manifested by this president and his administration.

It is rather like the Republican Party today, in my mind they have much in common with modern liberals, not on the surface but in their religious fervor to control the actions of individuals. Religious republicans desire to control our bodies and modern liberals desire to control our minds.

Since mind and body are connected, it is ultimately total control each seeks but through different avenues. I dont fear the religious zealots nearly as much as I do the modern day liberal totalitarians. Sex is a powerful motivator and not many people will take kindly to having that part of their lives controlled by others.

You must have either a keyword blocker here, someone is hacking between us – or your monitor is real time.

Let’s try another pathway. GSachs and Bain Capital secret law firms (M.N.A.T and Paul Traub) have confessed to lying under oath 34 times to a chief federal justice in the cases of intentionally tanking a public company e.Toys and robbing the federal estate of e.Toys.

Doing so by Breach of Fiduciary Duty as M.N.A.T is the court approved client for e.Toys and Traub was the court approved client for e.Toys creditors.

But Traub and M.N.A.T both SECRETLY work for GSachs and Bain.

Thus they sold out their court approved client to benefit their SECRET clients in a massive SEC, STate and FEderal fraud & Perjury Scheme.

Because it is all connected to the fact that RMoney owned a federal prosecutor in Delaware where M.N.A.T law firm partner became the U.S. Att. who buried the case from investigation for the better part of a decade.

Eric Holder’s DOJ would rather protect the phony reputation of the DOJ;
than to prosecute Organized Crimes!

If you comments get blocked, it’s Akismet, the spam filter used by WP. Akismet has a problem with false positives. There are only 4 blocked words on this blog. I unblock false positives as soon as I can.

While I agree with unloading Holder, I think the more important chore would be to repeal the Patriot Act and the AUMF and then make the FISA court more than a rubber stamp. If the law is not changed, any AG or DOJ can request the taps or get a warrant to surveil just about any journalist.

“The Act allowed any district court judge in the United States to issue such surveillance orders [which take into account] email or web addresses, which often contain content in the address information”

After all, Holder pointed out, he did nothing. That is, of course, precisely the point.
———————
I didn’t do anything either. I got fired anyway. The difference is, I’m telling the truth.
———————-
Dick Cheney, who seemed to have an insatiable appetite for sins to eat.

Dick wants an aircraft carrier. He’s never been in the military in his life, so why does he want an aircraft carrier?
———————————————————-
When the president wanted the authority to kill any American he deemed a threat without charge or trial, it was Holder who went public to announce the “kill list” policy.

Isn’t this special. Why are they buying all the ammo?
——————————————————————————–
Last week, the Justice Department confirmed that it was Holder who personally approved the equally abusive search of Fox News correspondent James Rosen’s e-mail and phone records in another story involving leaked classified information.

Yet, at this month’s hearing, the attorney general had had his fill. Accordingly, Holder adopted an embarrassing mantra of “I have no knowledge” and “I had no involvement” throughout the questioning. When he was not reciting the equivalent to his name, rank and serial number, he was implicating his aide, Deputy Attorney General James Cole. Cole, it appears, is Holder’s sin eater. Holder was so busy denying responsibility for today’s scandals, he began denying known facts about older scandals. For example, Holder was asked about an earlier scandal in his administration in the handling of the “Fast and Furious” program where guns were allowed to be sold to criminal gangs. Holder insisted that Ronald C. Machen Jr., the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, was not told to decline the prosecution of Holder for contempt of Congress after refusing to turn over key documents and that “[Machen] made the determination about what he was going to do on his own.” However, Holder’s deputy, Cole, wrote to Machen to inform him (before the contempt citation even reached his office) that Main Justice “has determined that the Attorney General’s response to the subpoena . . . does not constitute a crime.”

It depends on what the meaning of “is” “is”. Just make sure you don’t get a stain on the dress.

“I agree the more strategic goal would be the repeal of the patriot act yet the first step is often dislodging from power those who use it for abuse purposes.”

And here I would like to addreess the term “abuse”. Evidently, you do not consider the act of passing the law an “abuse”. Fourth Amendment protections notwithstanding, it’s all jake with you. Unless a negro is “in power”.

Because, I don’t see you demanding the arrest and trial of the abusers [torturers, war mongers, surveillance addicts] of the previous administration, despite the fact that they are not “in power”.

Meanwhile, the law is the law. Even if a Negro is enforcing it. To protect you.

I knew you’d like that one. It has so many uses: Like “You abecedarian teenager, you. Don’t tell me how to drive!” or the soon-to-be ubiquitous, “I’d rather be an abecedarian than a pompous fool with too much experience.”

“The Act allowed any district court judge in the United States to issue such surveillance orders [which take into account] email or web addresses, which often contain content in the address information”

*******************
Your wiki research notwithstanding, a federal district judge may not violate one law to effectuate another one. Chilling the First Amendment with tenuously reasoned intrusions into the affairs of the press via a court order doesn’t withstand any First Amendment analysis.

Although everyone is attacking Steve Miller for his work at the IRS, let us remember the good things about him. In particular, I still enjoy his work on “Children of The Future,” “Sailor,” “The Joker,” “Fly Like An Eagle,” and “Take the Money and Run,” to name a few.

On whoever posted: “I agree the more strategic goal would be the repeal of the patriot act yet the first step is often dislodging from power those who use it for abuse purposes.”

I still say that I the killer “grand plan” would be mine, as follows:
1) Total repeal of the Patriot Act in tandem, and only in tandem with ….
2) Total repeal of the Affordable Care Act.

I see it as a win-win. There’s a lot that sucks with the Patriot Act and a LOT that sucks with the half-baked ACA. Now the Unions are starting to line up against it, everyone and their brother wants an exemption or carve out, etc. etc. ad infinitum. What you think?

“Please let us know your true feelings about, as you say, a “Negro is enforcing it.” or that “a negro is in power”.

“I would enjoy reading your views on the matter.”

Okay.

I think we are better off when “Negro”/”Hispanic”/and/or “Asian” people have the opportunity and/or obligation to enforce the laws that we the people passed in the democratic process. It shows that this or that ethnic minority has embraced the law, the Constitution and the society they are designed to protect.

“Your wiki research notwithstanding, a federal district judge may not violate one law to effectuate another one. Chilling the First Amendment with tenuously reasoned intrusions into the affairs of the press via a court order doesn’t withstand any First Amendment analysis.”

Use of any federal agency…the IRS, FBI, CIA, NSA…to investigate and intimidate any Amerikan citizen simply for exercising 1st amendment rights is unconstitutional and this citizen should have legal recourse against this agency, but none of the pundits critical of Holder seem to want to
apply the same standard to the Bush administration…and engage in a sin of ommission when they dont discuss this in the context of the Bush administration who used the IRS, FBI, CIA, and NSA to try to intimidate critics of some of his policies

“That term went out of vogue about 40 years ago. A lot like pbh’s mindset.”

As Steve Martin once said, “Comedy is not pretty.”

Imagine, you don’t fathom the reason why I might choose to use a word that is no longer in “vogue” to describe a behavior pattern that is kinda built on that out of “vogue” perspective. How peculiar of me.

Excerpt:
NEW YORK — U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is expected to meet this week with the Washington bureau chiefs of several major media outlets to discuss the Justice Department’s guidelines for dealing with journalists in leak investigations.

It’s not yet certain exactly when the meeting (or meetings) will take place, but a Justice Department official confirmed to The Huffington Post that it would be sometime over the next two days. Politico’s Mike Allen reported Wednesday morning that the DOJ began contacting bureau chiefs on Tuesday. The Huffington Post’s Washington bureau chief, Ryan Grim, also has been contacted.

The news of a meeting between Holder and the bureau chiefs comes amid widespread criticism from journalists and civil liberties advocates over the DOJ’s seizure of Associated Press phone records and an accusation that Fox News reporter James Rosen could be part of a criminal conspiracy for his reporting.

The fact that Holder is meeting with the bureau chiefs is on the record, but Nanda Chitre, acting director of the DOJ’s public affairs office, confirmed to The Huffington Post that the meeting itself will be off the record. Media organizations, however, will surely want such a newsworthy meeting with the attorney general to be on the record, and it remains to be seen if they will agree to meet under off-the-record ground rules.

Excerpt:
NEW YORK — U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is expected to meet this week with the Washington bureau chiefs of several major media outlets to discuss the Justice Department’s guidelines for dealing with journalists in leak investigations.

It’s not yet certain exactly when the meeting (or meetings) will take place, but a Justice Department official confirmed to The Huffington Post that it would be sometime over the next two days. Politico’s Mike Allen reported Wednesday morning that the DOJ began contacting bureau chiefs on Tuesday. The Huffington Post’s Washington bureau chief, Ryan Grim, also has been contacted.

The news of a meeting between Holder and the bureau chiefs comes amid widespread criticism from journalists and civil liberties advocates over the DOJ’s seizure of Associated Press phone records and an accusation that Fox News reporter James Rosen could be part of a criminal conspiracy for his reporting.

The fact that Holder is meeting with the bureau chiefs is on the record, but Nanda Chitre, acting director of the DOJ’s public affairs office, confirmed to The Huffington Post that the meeting itself will be off the record. Media organizations, however, will surely want such a newsworthy meeting with the attorney general to be on the record, and it remains to be seen if they will agree to meet under off-the-record ground rules.

You are not fooling anyone here with your vainglorious attempts at proclamations of your own wit and wisdom. The one that brought up the race issue with regard to Holder was you. You can look at any post I have made in this blog and I and every normal person here does not consider his race to be an issue. But it is with you. Then you runaway with then declaring that you embrace several other races of people and are glad when they embrace the law. The fact that you even brought up the “negro” bit is like looking into the eyes of someone and seeing their soul. And what we can behold is a closeted bigot. (oh, I guess with you souls do not exist and as an extension the allegory to it is just as meaningless to you but might be interesting to others)

Then you make a sophmoric attempt at pointing out logical errors to declare your self perceived victory over others’ arguments.

And like your kindred trolls out there, you don’t even realize that others are looking at you with contempt, because you are in your own mind the smartest one out there. Well good for you. So frankly what would it matter in what me or others here offers as rebuttals to your contentions or positions, because you are going to come up with some jackass response from your jackassed bigoted mouth. And likewise it is just like being out on the ranch and having to endure the braying. It is annoying, but it really doesn’t matter in light of the rest of the world.

So, relegate yourself to your compatriots on stormfront so you can be reunited with your herd.

Please don’t attempt to hide apologetics behind the race card. It is what it is. You’re not supposed to change your calls on balls and strikes simply because it’s ‘your guy’ who’s in there.

To say that the use of torture and extraordinary rendition; suspending habeas corpus without the existence of insurrection or rebellion; carrying out a policy of warrantless wiretapping as if the 4th Amendment did not exist and issuing executive orders authorizing the extrajudicial execution American citizens is somehow excused because the president is black or ‘they did it first’ is a load of shit and you know it.

But, I hear you say you would “rather have an intelligent, centrist Democrat president using the Constitution as a urinal puck, than a developmentally disabled fake Republican (certainly a fake conservative) liar, war profiteer and mass murderer. (Given the validity of your constitutional complaints, I suppose that BHO is a murderer, but at least a much more selective one, and possibly in the cause of something marginally defensible, morally…like killing our enemies.)”

As you so astutely stated above, the law is the law. And the law is all about the categorical imperative. Accordingly, no matter how much you may plead that your guys are somehow more special than others, that they “don’t deserve this,” that they “were building a house.”

The categorical imperative says “deserve’s got nothing to do with it.”

The law is the law Pete. Take some time to listen to yourself.

“Above all, don’t lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others.” — Dostoevsky

The wikipedia link pbh provided, quoted Jefferson’s words ” ” … strict observance of the written law is doubtless one of the high duties of a good citizen, but it is not the highest. The laws of necessity, of self-preservation, of saving our country when in danger, are of higher obligation. To lose our country by a scrupulous adherence to the written law, would be to lose the law itself, with life, liberty, property and all those who are enjoying them with us; thus absurdly sacrificing the ends to the means.”

But in so doing left out the words that immediately preceded the quote:

Elaine: Thank you. One can usually get away with wordsmithing, i.e. using Aryan instead of (the words you mentioned), and “legacy costs” instead of “unfunded mandates”, just to name a couple.

pbh51: What, you don’t like the trade? I’m just pointing out 2 major headaches that can be rethought from 2 opposing perspectives. One a law that was rushed through to deal with the War on Terrror (now renamed with more wordsmithing) and one a law that was barely passed with unfulfilled promises (lies) rife with unintended consequences that affect both opponents and proponents, that with soon suck up all the expendable cash available that the govt can borrow from the Chinese to the detriment of all other needs we have. All to pass out some minimal hc for people who didn’t pay for it.

“The fact that you even brought up the “negro” bit is like looking into the eyes of someone and seeing their soul.”

Oh, do forgive me if I read into your selective memorial an imputation of bias against the perfectly legal behavior of the current Holder versus the outright crimes of the prior series of unlawful AGs.

Where is your outrage at the sanction of torture? Oh, my heavens, some irresponsible journal tits have been legally investigated! Off with their heads!

“it is just like being out on the ranch and having to endure the braying.”

Oh I forgot. If you fire Holder we would have to pay for his unemployment. If you ask for his resignation and he declines then he could be put on the shelf while he collects salary on admin leave. Then after a while the govt will figure it out and then release him and get him his unemployment. Sorry.

Geeba Geeba, I don’t think Holder has to worry about unemployment compensation.. His wife is a prominent DC obstetrician. For all we know, Holder offered to resign and Obama turned him down. Saw that progressive caucus member John Conyers was defending him today as he was attacked by two far right wing republicans. I don’t know if he should resign or not. The press ultimately will have a difficult time siding with Issa and his crew, and that bodes well for Holder’s future if he decides to stay.

“Please don’t attempt to hide apologetics behind the race card. It is what it is. You’re not supposed to change your calls on balls and strikes simply because it’s ‘your guy’ who’s in there.”

I am not the one trying to change the strike zone. To semi-quote a former Secretary of Defense, “You [play] with the [strikezone] that you have, not with the one that you would like.”

And, if we are going to follow the baseball analogy, I am the one who wants all of the steriod users disqualified. Starting with B v G.

W/R/T race: That’s what I call high and tight. People who exercise their outrage at investigations of the surreptitious disclosure of the classified documents of one adminsitration but look upon prior disclosures by insiders of a prior adminstration with indifference [ie: Valarie Plame] are open to having their motives questioned, I/M/H/O. And if I want to jack them up by tossing out the odd word, well, eat me.

I am much amused by all the angry liberals who complain that Holder has failed the nation by not proceeding against Cheney, et al. I am equally amused by those who insist that he should be impeached for somehow being responsible for a lawful investigation of security leaks.

“the law is all about the categorical imperative.”

I am just as happy to argue absolutes as anyone. But that is not the business of governance. Plato dreamed of philoshper kings. Euripides saw through that ruse.

My pennance will be watching you limp from the field disarmed and unmanned.

Please, please come back. Come back. Shane.

And tell me why you think that the crimes of Bush and Co. are so much more excusable than the very legal actions of the current elected (twice, by historic majorities, not by USSC fiat) administration.

“The policies at issue are the same ones (continued and expanded by Obama) that you despised G.W.B. for instituting in the first place.”

I am just not willing to accept this line of argument. It assumes absolutes that are simply not achievable.

Also, I take issue with “expanded”. That is a very equivocal term that could be applied with equal accuracy to the stock market. I could also suggest the term “reduced” which might refer to the number of troops fighting overseas.

Is it possible that you think that the war powers of the President have been “expanded” by his use of drones that kill fewer than a fraction of the civilians that were annihilated by previous, less sophisticated, weapons of war (I’m talking 1,000-maybe versus 100,000-likely) and have enabled our country to “reduce” its international force by some 1,000,000 constantly rotating troops?

you have an interesting take on things. Not that I agree but you bring in valid points.

But you seem to be justifying the means by saying but hey everything seems better. For example your take on the use of drones reducing civilian casualties and allowing us to field fewer troops. All good outcomes in themselves but not necessarily the ultimate good. The ultimate good in war is a quick end with a clear victor. War by its nature is immoral in its effect upon people and to try and make it moral by reducing civilian casualties or putting fewer troops in the field merely extends pain and suffering.

We would still be fighting the Civil War if we only used drones and tried to limit or eliminate civilian casualties.

Today, I was driving home…. Behind me was a vehicle equipped with lights etc…. From a distance it looked like a cop SUV….. Not doing anything wrong I just slowed down…. So they could pass…. On the side of it said…Homeland Security Police….. It also had Federal Protection Service….. I don’t know much about the duties and powers of the same…. But isn’t that darn close to a Standing Army….. Just asking your take on it….

Furthermore. I think holder should be taken seriously….. He is a liar and a frontman…… He will take an easy out after the meeting with the press…. All psychopaths have varying degrees of intelligence which translates to survival skills…. In my opinion…..

I read the links people post and right smack dab in the middle of the one you placed for my consideration was good ol’ Thomas J. Now, in all honesty, how could I pass it up?!

I expected the words quoted to come from the 1820’s when he decided his legacy needed some fixing up and so started taking full credit for the DOI etc. I was rather surprised to find that those words came in a letter in Sept. of 1810.

At any rate, the last paragraph of this letter is a bit humorous when juxtaposed to this column upon which we are all commenting … “I have indulged freer views on this question, on your assurances that they are for your own eye only, and that they will not get into the hands of newswriters. I met their scurrilities without concern, while in pursuit of the great interests with which I was charged. But in my present retirement, no duty forbids my wish for quiet.”

The best copy I could find is at this link (page 146 to the top of page 150)

Regardless of one’s views of his tenure as AG, Mr. Holder will have to resign because his effectiveness, such as it is, has been irreversibly compromised. However, he should not resign immediately since it would be widely seen as a capitulation to Republican pressure.

Having said that, I hasten to add that I feel no particular sympathy for the travails of the press. All of the outrage is coming from the same group of people who served as a virtual propaganda arm of the Bush administration while the country was allowing fear to completely replace reason in the adoption of legislative and foreign policy responses to terrorism. The actions of the DOJ in its investigation of leaks is a quite logical application of authority which journalists have not found objectionable when directed elsewhere.

“Last week, the top lawyer and 34-year-veteran of the CIA, John Rizzo, explained to PBS’ Frontline that Obama has “changed virtually nothing” from Bush policies in these areas, and this week, the ACLU explains that “most [Bush] policies remain core elements of our national security strategy today.“ At some point very soon, this basic truth will be impossible to deny with a straight face even for the most hardened loyalists of both parties, each of whom have been eager, for their own reasons, to deny it (and even the two differences cited there, though positive, are wildly exaggerated by Obama defenders: the torture techniques authorized by Bush were no longer in use and the CIA black sites were empty by the time Obama was inaugurated; by contrast, there is ample evidence that the Obama administration continues to use torture by proxy and rendition/CIA-black-sites by proxy as well).

The ACLU then highlights one of the most perverse though revealing ironies of Democratic Party opinion on civil liberties in the Obama age: the way in which Bush’s attempt merely to imprison a U.S. citizen without due process (or merely to eavesdrop on citizens) prompted such outrage, while Obama’s claimed right to assassinate U.S. citizens without due process provokes virtually no protest:”

…

“During the Bush era, the actions and condemnations of the ACLU received ample positive attention from progressives. That, of course, is no longer true, and this damning report will likely be ignored in most of those circles, just as this truly remarkable comment from the ACLU’s Executive Director has been. And, as usual, anyone urging that attention be paid to these facts will be met with demands that eyes be diverted instead to how scary Sarah Palin Christine O’Donnell Michele Bachmann Rick Perry is, and then this will all blissfully fade away in a cloud of partisan electioneering even with the election more than a year away.

Either way, this creeping unchecked authoritarianism marches forward unabated, and is now — rather than the province of the right-wing GOP – fully bipartisan consensus. I really don’t understand how progressives think they’ll be taken seriously the next time there is a GOP President and they try to resurrect their feigned concern for these matters; they’ll be every bit as credible as conservatives who pretend to be deficit-warriors and defenders of restrained government only when the other party is in power. ”

Pbh: “Also, I take issue with “expanded”. That is a very equivocal term that could be applied with equal accuracy to the stock market. I could also suggest the term “reduced” which might refer to the number of troops fighting overseas.

Is it possible that you think that the war powers of the President have been “expanded” by his use of drones that kill fewer than a fraction of the civilians that were annihilated by previous, less sophisticated, weapons of war (I’m talking 1,000-maybe versus 100,000-likely) and have enabled our country to “reduce” its international force by some 1,000,000 constantly rotating troops?”

Glen Geenwald from article above: “The ACLU then highlights one of the most perverse though revealing ironies of Democratic Party opinion on civil liberties in the Obama age: the way in which Bush’s attempt merely to imprison a U.S. citizen without due process (or merely to eavesdrop on citizens) prompted such outrage, while Obama’s claimed right to assassinate U.S. citizens without due process provokes virtually no protest:

Critically, the ACLU emphasizes that this Obama fixation — wildly expanded programs of targeted killings even of U.S. citizens far from any battlefield — is as threatening to the rule of law, and at least as dangerous, as any policy implemented by Bush/Cheney”

AY: “On the side of it said…Homeland Security Police….. It also had Federal Protection Service….. I don’t know much about the duties and powers of the same…. But isn’t that darn close to a Standing Army….. Just asking your take on it….”

AY,

That sounds more like a federal police power issue. There is no such thing as a general federal police power. That grew out of the narcotic tax acts of the early 20th century and the line of cases following Wickard v. Filburn regarding the interstate commerce clause– stretching it beyond anything it was ever intended to be.

Not that I have a problem with a reasonable federal police power, but there needs to be a reckoning in the form of a constitutional convention SPECIFICALLY ENUMERATING THE POWERS that we’ve grown accustomed to and the states taking back those powers they never intended the liberal Justices of SCOTUS to take away from them.

“the two differences cited there, though positive, are wildly exaggerated by Obama defenders: the torture techniques authorized by Bush were no longer in use and the CIA black sites were empty by the time Obama was inaugurated”

Ending, instead of starting, three wars (including now the War on Terror), that don’t count?

“the way in which Bush’s attempt merely to imprison a U.S. citizen without due process (or merely to eavesdrop on citizens) prompted such outrage, while Obama’s claimed right to assassinate U.S. citizens without due process provokes virtually no protest:”

That is because there is nothing inherently immoral with shooting an axe murderer in the face.

I am perfectly willing to discuss how, why and when an individual might be judged to be an axe murderer. I am also willing to discuss other measures that might be taken to put such people out of business. I also view the use of drones as a mixed blessing, to say the least. But, worse than Bush? Puhhhhleeaaazzzze.

And, by the way, while we are not on the subject, I totally reject the notion that Eric Holder has done anything unconstitutional with regard to the Justice Department’s investigation of the Associated Press, Faux Noise or any other member of the fourth estate. A breach of national security in the form of disclosing classified documents is a Federal crime. It is the responsibility of the AG to investigate such matters. Period.

See … I have mespo on one side and you on the other and of course I like and respect you both so the dilemma circles. He was, indeed, all those things you mention including a coward … but his ideas and his ability to express those ideas was superb.

Back in the day … had we voted for President and had I been one of the fortunate few permitted to vote, I would have gone for Adams. (Burr notwithstanding) but in 1804 Pinckney would have been too much of a Federalist for me so I would have voted for Jefferson. And so the push/pull continues.

Borders and cultures are changed by war, been happening for as long as man has walked upright. To the victor go the spoils. The various tribes had more than ample opportunity to kick the white man out, they blew it and the rest is history.

I am not sure you can use today’s culture to judge a culture 100, 200 years in the past. Living humans want it both ways, we want to judge the past actions of our ancestors based on our standards and we dont want to be judged based on their standards.

I would love to see a debate between Thomas Jefferson and Martin Luther King, Jr.. I wonder how Jefferson would treat his ownership of slaves?

I would rather advocate a measured response to a measurable threat. If the Martians are attacking, then maybe nukes are a reasonable response, although they probably wouldn’t change much. Anything short of that and I’d be inclined to be a bit more surgical.

“The various tribes had more than ample opportunity to kick the white man out, they blew it and the rest is history.”

Disease played more a part in Native American demise than Cortez and/or Sheridan. I am not at all clear why you appear to be so sanguine about all that.

“I am not sure you can use today’s culture to judge a culture 100, 200 years in the past.”

My bologna has a first name, it’s O-S-C-A-R.
My bologna has a second name, it’s M-A-Y-E-R.
Oh, I love to eat it everyday, and if you ask me why, I’ll say,
‘Cause Oscar Mayer has a way with B-O-L-O-G-N-A.

“I would love to see a debate between Thomas Jefferson and Martin Luther King, Jr. I wonder how Jefferson would treat his ownership of slaves?”

Me: “The policies at issue are the same ones (continued and expanded by Obama) that you despised G.W.B. for instituting in the first place.”

Pbh: “I am just not willing to accept this line of argument. It assumes absolutes that are simply not achievable.

Pbh: “Glenn Greenwald” Arguing from Authority?”

No Pete, as I showed you, the ACLU deems the Obama administration as worse than Bush/Cheney per condoning the use of torture and extraordinary rendition; suspending habeas corpus without the existence of insurrection or rebellion; carrying out a policy of warrantless wiretapping as if the 4th Amendment did not exist and issuing executive orders authorizing the extrajudicial execution American citizens.

Apparently you’re too entrenched in your party line thinking to realize just how unprincipled you sound in light of your past objections regarding Bush/Cheney.

Wrong Pete. There is no specifically enumerated police power in the constitution. It’s pure fiction created from tax acts and the progeny of Wickard v. Filburn.

Professor Charles Whitebread: “The very first criminal law at the Federal level in this country to criminalize the non-medical use of drugs came in 1914. It was called the Harrison Act and there are only three things about the Harrison Act that we need to focus on today.

Number one is the date. Did you hear the date, 1914? Some of you may have come this morning thinking that we have used the criminal law to deal with the non-medical use of drugs since the beginning of the Republic or something. That is not true. The entire experiment of using the criminal sanction to deal with the non-medical use of drugs really began in this country in 1914 with the Harrison Act.

The second interesting thing about the Harrison Act was the drugs to which it applied, because it applied to almost none of the drugs we would be concerned about today. The Harrison Act applied to opium, morphine and its various derivatives, and the derivatives of the coca leaf like cocaine. No mention anywhere there of amphetamines, barbiturates, marijuana, hashish, hallucinogenic drugs of any kind. The Harrison Act applied only to opium, morphine and its various derivatives and derivatives of the coca leaf like cocaine.

The third and most interesting thing for you all as judges about the Harrison Act was its structure, because the structure of this law was very peculiar and became the model for every single piece of Federal legislation from 1914 right straight through 1969. And what was that model?

It was called the Harrison Tax Act. You know, the drafters of the Harrison Act said very clearly on the floor of Congress what it was they wanted to achieve. They had two goals. They wanted to regulate the medical use of these drugs and they wanted to criminalize the non-medical use of these drugs. They had one problem. Look at the date — 1914. 1914 was probably the high water mark of the constitutional doctrine we today call “states’ rights” and, therefore, it was widely thought Congress did not have the power, number one, to regulate a particular profession, and number two, that Congress did not have the power to pass what was, and is still known, as a general criminal law. That’s why there were so few Federal Crimes until very recently.”

“as I showed you, the ACLU deems the Obama administration as worse than Bush/Cheney per condoning the use of torture and extraordinary rendition; suspending habeas corpus without the existence of insurrection or rebellion; carrying out a policy of warrantless wiretapping as if the 4th Amendment did not exist and issuing executive orders authorizing the extrajudicial execution American citizens.”

There is an awful lot of mud here. And I am watching shite equated with shinola to no positive affect.

I respect the ACLU as much as I respect you. Which is a lot.

It seems to me, however, that the bigger picture should also be an element of your critique. Yes, what harms one person harms us all. So too what protects one of us protects the rest of us. At least a little. There is a balance that has to be maintained.

I am not afraid to say that Obama has supervised the murder of innocents. I also am not afraid to say that he has protected many more innocents and that there are inevitable trade offs. Fortunately, my hands are as clean as Pilate’s

“I forgot to mention that he was a plagarist” … yes, that too … he would have made a great editor.

Here are the words from someone who agrees completely with you:

“I think Thomas Jefferson is one of the most deeply creepy people in American history,” said Paul Finkelman, a professor at Albany Law School and the author of “Slavery and the Founders,” which outlines the evasions of earlier generations of Jefferson scholars.”

Me: “There is no such thing as a general federal police power. That grew out of the narcotic tax acts of the early 20th century and the line of cases following Wickard v. Filburn regarding the interstate commerce clause– stretching it beyond anything it was ever intended to be.

Not that I have a problem with a reasonable federal police power, but there needs to be a reckoning in the form of a constitutional convention SPECIFICALLY ENUMERATING THE POWERS that we’ve grown accustomed to and the states taking back those powers they never intended the liberal Justices of SCOTUS to take away from them.”

You said…

Pbh: “Article I, Section 8″

And I said you were wrong.

The unbounded expansion of federal power via the interstate commerce clause was the direct result of Congress and SCOTUS sacrificing the constitution in the name of the New Deal.

“I don’t have that problem. Jefferson was an immoral, amoral, unethical, self serving degenerate hypocrite. And a liar.”

***************

Speaking purely as an observer of one and student of the other, I have complete confidence that Mr. Jefferson would relish those sentiments coming as they do from your keyboard. It’s sort of life affirming.

Anyway, here’s a little more balanced view from a contemporary author:

“He dreamed big but understood that dreams become reality only when their champions are strong enough and wily enough to bend history to their purposes.”
― Jon Meacham, Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power

Once your head comes out of that cloud (or wherever it is being engulfed) you might want to think about that as you rail against most anyone in power.

Finkleman’s a Jefferson hater from way back. Can’t seem to get over the historical fact that the man who declared it “self-evident” that “all men are created equal” owned and even whipped slaves.Finkelman seems to breath only the rarified air so prevalent on college campuses but rarely tasted outside of those ivy covered walls where the rest of us confront both our triumphs and our failings.

Here’s another historian of note you may have heard of who disagrees with the distinguished professor of law from Albany:

The principles of Jefferson are the definitions and axioms of free society. And yet they are denied, and evaded, with no small show of success. Some dashingly call them “glittering generalities”; another bluntly calls them “self evident lies”; and still others insidiously argue that they apply only to “superior races.” These expressions, differing in form, are identical in object and effect—the supplanting the principles of free government . . . We must repulse them, or they will subjugate us.

This is a world of compensations; and he who would be no slave, must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it.

All honor to Jefferson—to the man who, in the concrete pressure of a struggle for national independence by a single people, had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to introduce into a merely revolutionary document, an abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times, and so to embalm it there, that to-day, and in all coming days, it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very harbingers of re-appearing tyranny and oppression.

~A. Lincoln

But who is this uneducated frontiersman who led a nation through a civil war on precisely these issues to argue with Finkleman or even pbh?

“Once your head comes out of that cloud (or wherever it is being engulfed) you might want to think about that as you rail against most anyone in power.”

Cut to the quick am I.

Jefferson’s accomplishments held up against mine own and I am judged wanting. Oh dear. Oh dear. How can I survive this?

Yes, I never have owned slaves. I never borrowed money, which I never intended to repay, using my human “property” as surety. I never forced myself on a person that I “owned”. I never forced my way into public office by virtue of votes granted to that “property” owned by me and my fellow aristocrats. I never attacked my own country for having the temerity of doing free trade with a country I didn’t like. I never advocated, much less orginated, the notion of secession from the Union. I never acted directly to suborn the lawfully elected government of which I was Secretary of State. I never attempted to undermine an actual treaty of that same government. And, I never advocated slavery as a solution to the “problem” of slavery.

“Why is it bologna to not judge a past society by our moral standards?”

Because Frederick Douglas is not the first person to show you that all those equivocations are so much donkey doo doo.

There were plenty of Jefferson’s contemporaries who saw straight through his hipocrisy, many more before and many after. The 3/5s rule was a compromise, remember? Which means that there were a lot of people who thought it was a devil’s bagain. And they were right.

Jefferson was a despicable, amoral excretion and if not for his possession of property in the many forms then marketable he would have been nothing other than a failed farmer.

“All honor to Jefferson—to the man who, in the concrete pressure of a struggle for national independence by a single people, had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to introduce into a merely revolutionary document, an abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times, and so to embalm it there, that to-day, and in all coming days, it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very harbingers of re-appearing tyranny and oppression.

“~A. Lincoln”

I guess you don’t exactly get Lincoln’s irony. I think the word “embalm” should give you a taste of what Lincoln thought of Jefferson.

He could have said “enshrine” with those same two sylabic spaces. Lincoln knew the language. Instead, he chose to “rebuke” and bury the tyranical tool.

“I guess you don’t exactly get Lincoln’s irony. I think the word “embalm” should give you a taste of what Lincoln thought of Jefferson.”

********************

Thanks, Humpty, for the insight.

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master – – that’s all.”

Mr Freud would be very amused. You appear to show a strong affinity for the “master”, whoever that may be at any given time.

I, on the other hand, prefer my definitions to be accurate and accountable, with no “master”. Now, if you find fault with any of my linguistic notations, I am perfectly happy to consult with you and settle on a fair meaning for each and every one.

“The unbounded expansion of federal power via the interstate commerce clause was the direct result of Congress and SCOTUS sacrificing the constitution in the name of the New Deal.

“Great policy; a botched abortion legally speaking.”

Jefferson freaked when Hamilton proposed a national bank. Mostly because Jeff was afraid that the bank would then tell him to sell his slaves to pay his debts (okay, I’m making that up, but not really).

This is just such an old, old argument.

And Hamilton and Marshall had it right from the get go. The proof of which is in what Jefferson did as soon as he had his hand on the wheel. Pedal to the metal, Baby!

Just as a General, he did as much if not more than George Washington in protecting this country. We’re talking Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces! He was the father of the nuclear deterrent that kept the Soviets from burning us to a cinder.

You are certainly entitled to your opinion. My opinion is that Mr. Lincoln was working with all four, and then some, but most especially the “dead” thingie. W/R/T Jefferson and all that.

But, hey, let’s go with door # 3. “protect from decay” the equal rights of all men (herein understood to include women and Negroes, not originally intended by Jefferson but fully incorporated by the man who forced through the 13th amendment). Lincoln is making Jefferson EAT HIS WORDS. Swallow them. In his grave. And you still don’t get it.

“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Speaking of B v. G, that was clearly off-road. That said, if Congress refuses to exercise its lawful responsibility by virtue of its desire to protect its political majority (thank you Mr. Jefferson) from public scrutiny, then what are you gonna do about it?

I think this conversation, and I could be wrong, got started when I threw out my general and specific animosity toward Jefferson and all of his acolytes. You seemed to think that Jeff was a great advocate for freedom and I countered that with specific examples of where and when his notions of freedom lapsed. And so on.

Now, if I have any of this wrong or inside out, then I apologize.

But, yes, I think Lincoln wanted Jefferson’s words in the DOI preserved. Moreover, I think Lincoln wanted to jam them up Jefferson’s such and so. As far as he could. Again and again. Until he liked it. Until he begged for more

I’m mostly out of the loop recently and playing catch (up) as catch can, but I’d just like to say a big ol’

“What Bob and mespo said”

and

“Paul, based on your statements about Jefferson, you sound like the kind of guy who thinks the Mona Lisa sucks because it’s a tiny painting. There is a Chinese proverb you should learn and take to heart: better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without one.”

I’ll be seein’ ya’ll around as events allow. Keep on keepin’ on, Bob and Mark. The good fight is always worth fighting.

why is holder investigating anti-war activists? I would think they would generally be for Obama as they are most likely left wing orgs.

This guy Obama [and holder] doesnt like any form of criticism apparently.

When you start investigating your own because of some internal dissent, I think it is time to go. I can understand his willingness to investigate the tea party but anti-war groups? he is just out of control and over his head [Obama, holder is just his lap dog].

“why is holder investigating anti-war activists? I would think they would generally be for Obama as they are most likely left wing orgs.”

In your binary world, even perfectly legal, non-partisan investigations are somehow suspicious. The law in question has been around since the days of Saint Ronald. Now, however, since Obama is supposedly employing it, you are concerned.

And, not for nothing, but what kind of mind-set automatically assumes that anti-war organizations are “left wing”? Wasn’t Ron Paul anti war? Are you unaware that principled Conservatives opposed U.S. participation in both WW I and WW II?

If, as you appear to assume, Conservatism means the opposite of anti-war, is that not, in itself, the best argument against modern Conservatism?

Can Conservatism even be called conservative when it presents itself, as you appear to do, as the party of constant war?

I think these letters from congressmen to Holder was a request for Holder to investigate the unconstitutional activity of Mr. MUellers Orwellian FBI for investigating antiwar activists and critics of the establishment for exercising 1st amendment rights…when have these arrogant 30 year bureaucrats acting under color of law… at the FBI ever had a respect for constitutional rights….the bugging of MLK…the Geraldo program on Alexander Charns book on the FBI bugging the Supreme Court… .. http://www.amazon.com/Cloak-Gavel-Wiretaps-Informers-Supreme/dp/sitb-next/0252018710 …and the Writ of Certiori this writer filed with the Supreme Court on this same subject and the harrassment of this writer for this action…waco and the use of cs gas that resulted in the death of 25 children…dan burton investigation of fBI involvment with the Boston mafia…when are we going to have a congressional investigation of the unconstitutional activity of this orwellian agency and legislation that furthers
legal recourse allowed under the 4th, 1st, and other amendments of the constitution…???????

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